I am a long time C++ programmer. The customer wants to go to the web. Time for me to learn Java.

Access Modifiers

Just read a rant about a developer that likes to use parentheses to make the order of operations explicit. He does not want a reader of his code to need to know the operator precedence rules. As an extension, he also explicitly declares the access modifier for any java function that he writes.

This started a big discussion on what it means to not specify an access modifier for a Java function. In C++ it is easy. C++ class members without an access modifier are private. C++ structure members without an access modifier are public. However in Java, not specifying an access modifier means the function is package private.

Package private has no keyword. It is the access allowed when you do not specify a modifier. This causes the function to only be accessible by other members in the package. This is different than public, private, or protected. I am sure I learned this some time ago in my Java college class. However today it was solidified.